Weirdo Wednesday – November 16, 2011

Somewhere along the way I’m confident I played strip poker in mixed company. I’m positive tequila and locked doors were involved.

The art community in New York city is not inherently weird, or bizarre, but on occasion some of the ideas get pretty zany and extreme. Take the new exhibit by local artist Zefrey Throwell. His “I’ll Raise You One…” romp art show opened in TriBeCa’s Art In General gallery, over the weekend.

Through this week a total of 48 participants will literally gamble the clothes off their backs and breasts in the name of art. I’m talking the ancient and noble game of Strip Poker where anyone is subject to lose a shirt or their skivvies.

Anyone in the neighborhood can swing by to keep up on the action between 10:30 in the morning and 6:00 p.m. The poker table is in full view of the front window.

Let’s hope the front room is well heated before everything gets too perky.

Had I the body of Venus arising from the waves on a half-shell, I still have too much dignity to participate in a public game of strip poker.

Where’s Van Gogh when we need him? Art is dead, my love. Vampires and zombies are destroying modern literature. Sequels and bad remakes have made a travesty of film. And now naked people playing cards have replaced genuine visual art. I’d rather view an exhibition of “Dogs Playing Poker”. On velvet. Made in Tijuana.

In my next life I hope I’m reborn into the past where art meant art and no one played strip poker without that bottle of tequila you mentioned.